XRP Price Bucks Bearish Market Mood to Hit 13-Day High

XRP is reporting double-digit gains today, despite a generally bearish mood across the wider crypto markets.

The open-source token – which is developed largely by blockchain payments startup Ripple – was changing hands at $0.3251 at press time, having hit a 13-day high of $0.3241 at 14:00 UTC.

The world's third-largest cryptocurrency by market capitalization has appreciated by 17 percent in the last 24 hours and is the second best-performing cryptocurrency among top 100 cryptocurrencies on CoinMarketCap.

A major part of the rally, though, materialized in the couple of hours before publication – a surprising move, as the broader market is looking very risk averse. For instance, bitcoin is down 1 percent at $6,370, while 81 out of top 100 cryptocurrencies by market capitalization are reporting losses.

Some in the investor community are associating XRP's gains with reports stating that Ripple's xRapid product –  which uses the digital asset – could go live in the next month or so. The news may have put a bid under the oversold cryptocurrency, which is currently down 90 percent from the record high of $3.30 hit in January.

XRP has also seen a 72 percent rise in trading volume, backing up that theory. At press time, 24-hour trading volume stands at $458 million – the highest level since Aug. 17.

Over on the technical charts, XRP is teasing a long-term bullish reversal.

As can be seen, XRP is still trapped in a falling channel (bearish pattern).

A UTC close above the confluence of the 50-day moving average and the top end of the falling channel, currently located at $0.3282, would confirm a bearish-to-bullish trend change and could yield further gains.

The relative strength index (RSI) has turned bullish by moving above 50.00.

Disclosure: The author holds no cryptocurrency assets at the time of writing.

XRP image via Shutterstock; Charts by Trading View